Just like Major League Baseball, the fashion industry is scrambling to salvage a season.
Next week, the 5-million-square-foot Dallas Market Center just northwest of downtown Dallas will host its first wholesale market of the pandemic era. The apparel and accessories show, which is June 23-26, is expected to draw a couple thousand attendees.
But the pandemic era’s six-foot distancing rules will change things this time around.
Even before Dallas County Commissioners voted Friday to require masks in businesses, showrooms were following health officials’ guidelines to wear face coverings.
“About 90% of the showrooms have gentle reminders posted,” said Marty Leon, owner of the Leon & Associates, a wholesaler of women’s contemporary casual clothing.
After the ruling, the center said it will add temperature checks for all visitors.
The market show scene is usually filled with parties, fashion shows, speakers, seminars, valet parking, and courtesy buses to nearby hotels. None of that will happen next week. It will be more about getting business done, by appointment.
Foodservice will be limited to individually packaged items. Buyers will have more space to spread out while working. The Market Center’s main building has 15 levels with an atrium in the middle.
“We are expecting more drive-in traffic and fewer buyers than usual, but that’s also because we have strategically planned for multiple trade events this summer,” said Cindy Morris, president, and CEO of Dallas Market Center. “We have created a series of events in order to stretch out attendance but also to serve buyers on their schedule.”
To accommodate social distancing, only one or two people at a time will ride in the atrium’s elevators, and people will be asked to use every third step on the escalator. Many of the building’s bathrooms are small, so signs will recommend one person inside at a time.
Retailing is a relationship business. Many wholesale showrooms in the Market Center have operated there for decades selling to retail customers who come from all 50 states and 85 countries.
“When our customers come into town, the first thing they want to do is hug and kiss you because you’ve known them forever,” said Charlie Lytle, who has sold women’s apparel from his showroom in the Market Center for 30 years.
“Some buyers need a product immediately while others are planning farther ahead or may simply wait to visit until they feel more comfortable with travel,” Morris said.
Robin Gelfer Pierce, who owns Country Casuals in Brownsville, plans to drive nine hours to get to the show because she’s not ready to fly and her store needs fall merchandise.
“I’m reluctant, but I don’t have a choice. I sell clothes and gifts, and this is my last chance to buy in time for fall,” said Gelfer Pierce, who runs the 5,000-square-foot store founded by her parents 53 years ago.
“We’re mask-wearers down here in Brownsville. I don’t think they’re being as careful in Dallas,” she said. “If they took my temperature before I came in, I would be fine with that.”
Leon is glad the show is on next week, but he and others said they are worried about customers coming into Dallas from places in the U.S. and even other countries with low incidents of the coronavirus.
“We have an obligation to help retailers recover,” Leon said. “And I don’t want my customers to feel uncomfortable, but I want them to wear a mask.”
For the first time, competing apparel showrooms have created a Google Doc to share the names of retailers coming to buy next week, Leon said. “We shared our customers to help each other out.”
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